A Record Is Not Enough Ethiopia's coffee windfall, and what reached the farm gate By Wondwossen Mezlekia Part 3 of a five-part series. Parts 1 and 2 published June 26 and 28, 2026. Part 3: The coffee we cannot buy in Birr Walk into a kiosk in Addis Ababa and the coffee you are legally permitted to buy is, with narrow exceptions, the coffee the export market turned down. Grades one through five are reserved for export. What stays home is grade six and below. In the birthplace of Arabica, the household is left to drink what the world declined. Ethiopia already drinks a remarkable share of what it grows. Sector estimates put domestic consumption near half of production, among the highest on the continent, in a coffee culture older than most of the states now advising it on the subject. Coffee here is not a lifestyle product waiting to be marketed. The roasting pan, the three rounds, the smell crossing a neighbor's doorway before the first cup is poured: nobody needs a ca...